The Americans Want to Work Act would have added a Tier V of federal extended unemployment benefits — 20 additional weeks of benefits to workers in states with high unemployment rates. It would have also given a tax break to companies that hire the long-term unemployed.

99ers — those who've exhausted all 99 weeks of federal unemployment benefits available to them — organized a call-in campaign this week to senators, urging them to vote on the legislation.

LeMieux said he blocked the measure because of his concerns it would add to the deficit.

"Without knowing how much it is going to cost and how we're going to pay for it, while we're all certainly sympathetic and want to work to make people go back to work—my home state of Florida certainly suffering with very high unemployment—we need to know how we're going to pay for it so we don't put this debt on our children and grandchildren."

Stabenow countered, "The reality for us in America is that we will never get out of debt with more than 15 million people out of work."

It's unlikely Stabenow's bill will come up for a vote again, as Republicans are expected to win seats in the November election and have no interest in passing additional unemployment benefits, Mother Jones magazine reports.

Senate Democrats also sought to extend by three months the Temporary Assistance for Needy Families emergency fund, which expires today. The fund supports subsidized job creation programs in several states and has, by all accounts, been successful. The Center on Budget and Policy Priorities reports 240,000 unemployed Americans were put into jobs through the program. However, Sen. Mike Enzi (R.-Wyo.) opposed the measure, and the extension of the program is likely "dead in the water."